It was looking a tad worse for wear but I scrubbed it, gave it a lick of paint, well actually three scant licks of paint as I was being careful not to bung up the beautiful basket weave work with too much paint, redid the gilt spray effect by hand using acrylic gold paint and an artist's brush and replaced the entire seat cushion and upholstering it in some gorgeous satiny fabric I got for a steal in a sari fabric shop.

Here's the finished item

It's a tad more teal than in the photo and I think I've been sympathetic with my restoration but also added a touch of opulence. I can't stop looking at it!

I'm impressed. Very nice. I once found a chair, very much like that, left outside a neighbor's house and we too nabbed it and took it home. Then we discovered it was actually a bloody commode and we had to take it back outside and down the road. We couldn't stop giggling. Mortifying. X

Anna, this one was a commode too, I spoke to the old lady that was getting rid to ask permission and she said she was chucking it as she wasn't allowed to use it as her carers wouldn't empty it as the pot didn't have a lid (apparently the pots are worth quite a bit but she'd turfed that already).

Thankfully it didn't look like it had had much if any use so we just bashed the seat out and replaced it all, scrubbed it with bleach and repainted.